Industry Watch

We need to coin a new term: a measure of
constant change that exceeds the pace of ``internet time'' to such
a degree that it embodies Heisenbergian uncertainty: it's changing
so fast you can't say what it is. Because that's what's happening
in the embedded space, where developers are picking up Linux faster
than slang.

How about Unreal Time? Or Interbed Time? Hmm. Not quite
right. How about Protoreal Time? I like that one. In Greek proto
means first. It's the root of prototype. It also suggests protean,
the adjective for shape-changing derived from the Greek sea god,
Proteus, who could assume many forms. Protoreal puts change in the
domain of reality, a fundamental concept to people who design stuff
they call ``real time''. In fact, time isn't the only proteal
variable. So is space.

Business folks like to call categories ``spaces'', whether
they are real or not. Such is the case with the embedded Linux
``space''. The virtue of Linux to embedded developers is it
radically reduces the threshold for designing, prototyping and
making all kinds of stuff, and equipping that stuff to use the
Net--the prevailing environment for pretty much everything that can
conceivably find a reason to use it, which is pretty much
everything, period.

The same goes for BSD, by the way. Both Linux and BSD are
forms of UNIX that grow wild in nature, rather than in the private
habitats where captive OS species have been bred by their owners in
relative isolation for private purposes.

This threshold-reducing power is not well understood by those
whose knowledge of operating systems, however extensive, is
informed mostly by the domesticated varieties. These folks think
that well-bred operating systems help their owners ``capture'' or
``control'' some market ``space''.

For example, in a May 4, 2001 ZDNet story by Richard Simm,
IDC analyst Kevin Burden says the Linux PDA ``market'' is
``fragmented and new''. He also says, ``Without a standard OS,
devices may not be able to speak to each other or use the same
software, essentially making them islands when it comes to sharing
information, and that is a big detriment.'' He also adds, ``The key
to any OS is application support. Without it, you're starting from
ground zero with every OS and device using that OS.''

This ignores the infrastructural context in which every
operating system now lives: the ubiquitous world of protocols like
HTTP, XML and TCP/IP. These protocols were ubiquitized by their
wild and free nature. Every species of Linux and BSD are native to
that world's (the Net's) ecosystem. In fact, to a significant
degree, they define it.

The last I looked there were eight Linux-based PDAs and three
Linux distributions intended for PDAs, not counting Linux itself,
which any manufacturer is free to hack into any shape they like
(and which, in most cases, is exactly what they do). Meanwhile Palm
has one OS and two manufacturers (none Palm is willing to name,
other than itself), while Microsoft has one OS with a pile of OEMs.
As for applications, AgendaComputing, makers of the ``pure Linux''
Agenda PDA, says a ``couple thousand'' developers are working on
Linux PDA apps, and the AgendaVR was targeted to roll out in May
2001.

Credit where due: both Palm and Microsoft are very good at
their businesses, or they wouldn't be so successful. But their OSes
don't grow on trees. Linux does. So does BSD. And therein lies the
advantage--not for those OSes (which no vendor owns) but for
you.

If you want to make a PDA, there's less to stop you in Linux
and BSD than in any vendor-owned operating system. There's also
less to stop you from remaking that PDA. And remaking it again. And
again. There is also a growing multitude of folks ready to help,
even if all they do is share their hacks on the Net. In other
words, most of your OS-related resources also grow on trees.

PDAs are just one obvious embedded morphology. Thanks to
Linux it's a lot easier to make, and remake, anything. So what if
some designs use Linux while others use BSD or Windows CE or Palm
OS? Out here in Nature, applications do matter--but communications
matter more. If two devices are exchanging XML streams over TCP/IP
stacks, does it matter which operating systems are involved? It
only matters if those OSes impede functionality or slow down the
rate at which their makers can innovate.

Here's another angle on the matter: if you're living and
working in protoreality, nothing softens space and speeds up time
better than wild and free OSes like Linux and BSD. And if there is,
we'd love to write about it.

Speaking of that, I like the word protoreal so much I bought
the domain name. If you can think of a good way for us to use it,
let me know (doc@ssc.com). If not, it was still a protoreal move to
make.

Doc
Searls is senior editor of Linux Journal and a
coauthor of The Cluetrain
Manifesto.